The Lighthearted Quest (9 page)

Another Arab, in the baggy blue cotton breeches to which Julia was beginning to get accustomed, topped by an impeccable white jacket and a fez, stood bowing in the archway leading to the dining-room; as they sat down Julia observed that though in all other respects so neat, the servant's jaw and chin were covered with several days' stubbly black growth. After he had left the room, Mr. Lynch, forking in mouthfuls of a delicious risotto, pursued his theme.

“Did you notice Mahomet's beard?”

“Well, yes.”

“That's all part of the trouble. He used to keep shaved, clean as a whistle; especially on Fridays, when he went to the Mosque. Today's Friday—and just look at him.”

“I did,” said Julia candidly. “But what has Mahomet's not shaving got to do with the new Sultan?”

“Everything!” said Paddy Lynch explosively. “At the Mosque they pray for the Sultan as their Imam, sort of High Priest, ye-know—but the French have outed the one they recognise and believe in, and put in someone else. ‘Tis as though you were to ask Cat'lics to pray for the intentions of a new Pope, put in by the Russians, with the true Holy Father exiled some other place!” In his excitement Mr. Lynch relapsed surprisingly into his native idiom.

“Then why did the French do it?”

“Oh, the ould fella was just hopeless!—wouldn't sign any decrees, even those for reforms that the people themselves wanted; he was holding everything up. The French could hardly help themselves—'twas a regular
impasse.
But the cure is worse than the disease—now a lot of the Moors have stopped wanting even reforms, if they come from the French. Nationalism and traditionalism, fighting now on the same side, and the next minute fighting one another! But you can't touch a Moslem's faith—and that's what the Administration has done, God help them.” He sighed, gustily.

Mr. Lynch's words about the Moslem's faith reminded Julia
of the curious look Ali had given her after she had prayed at the Foucauld memorial, and she told her host about the small episode.

“Did you do that? Oh, good. No, Ali won't have thought it in the least odd; on the contrary, it will have impressed him a lot. They think Christians fearfully irreligious—and to see one praying at the shrine of a Christian marabout will have bucked him up no end.”

After lunch a telephone call came for Mr. Lynch, who hurried away; Julia sat on the verandah among stone troughs full of pink geraniums, revelling in the hot sun, or browsed among her host's books—she also gave some thought to what use she could best make of a cocktail party in the house of someone belonging to the Banque Regié Turque. It was stupid of her not to have found out how high up Mr. Bingham was, but she had been so interested in Ali and Mahomet, and the whole Moroccan set-up, that she hadn't. Oh well, time enough on the way. She was now glad that when Paddy asked her what she was doing in Morocco she had not told him, flat out, that she was looking for Colin Monro—it had been on the tip of her tongue to say so. But she might do better with a total stranger, over lots of drinks, especially if he was a foreigner. Mr. Bingham was obviously English or Irish—then why in the Banque Regié Turque?—but he would inevitably invite all his colleagues to his party.

He had done so, as Julia ascertained after a hurried dash down to the
Vidago,
where in the pilot's cabin she routed out a rather spectacular black and gold cocktail-dress, very décolletée, and black French sandals with straps threaded with gold. She looked out a hat, but decided against it—she knew that her hair, in certain circles, was one of her strong suits, however much Edina might rail against its length, and she might want her strongest suit tonight. When they called at the villa to pick up Mr, Lynch she knew that she had done right: his glance as he looked at her was one of those
involuntary tributes that are far more telling than any words. However, he used words too.

“Goodness, Julia, you will smash them! Have you any idea how beautiful you can make yourself when you try?”

She blew him a kiss.

“A pretty fair idea, dear Paddy—thanking you!”

“So I should suppose. A strengthener before the effort?”

“Oh dear no—I want to keep my head, in a strange town.”

On the way down—“What exactly
is
Mr. Bingham in the Banque Regié Turque? Do tell me,” Julia said.

“Oh, very senior. I think you'll like him, and his wife is a charmer.”

“Why is he in a Turkish Bank?”

“Oh, that's a long story. Buxtons were invited, practically, to come here, and refused—I can't imagine why. It was very mistaken. So the Banque Regié Turque stepped in, and a very good thing they have made of it; they very wisely took on Bingham to handle the English side of things.”

“I see. And who are his colleagues? Turks?”

“Oh, French and all sorts. There's a very amusing Armenian—you must meet him.”

“What's his name?”

“Panoukian.”

As they spun down a long boulevard Julia said, very casually—

“Have you run into my cousin Colin Monro out here?”

“Monro? No, I don't think so. What does he do?”

“Nothing very much, so far as I know. He sails a bit about all these ports, I think—oranges, or something.”

“Oh, one of these amateur smugglers,” said Mr. Lynch, rather contemptuously. Julia was struck by his jumping instantly to the same conclusion as Reeder. “They're such a bore, always getting into prison or some row, and wanting to be bailed out. They're a perfect pest to the Consulate.”

Julia held her tongue, and decided to concentrate on Mr.
Panoukian for the moment. Obviously Paddy knew nothing—anyway, Colin's account wasn't in his bank.

The Binghams' was a very large house on one of those earlier and staider avenues between the city proper and the flowery new garden suburb—as they walked up the flagged entrance-way a muffled roar of voices greeted them. Julia paused in the warm darkness, and sniffed—“Paddy, what is this heavenly smell?”

“Lemon-blossom,” replied Mr. Lynch; he stepped onto a flower-bed to pluck a spray from a tree. “There, you can tuck that in behind your sunburst,” he said—“Is it diamonds or Woolworths?”

In the house the party was huge, and already in full blast; Julia studied the company with interest. The women's clothes were very smart, but their hats, oddly, not nearly so good, and their hair and faces either over-done, or not really done at all. Registering such things was a sort of Pavlov reflex with her, but when Paddy introduced their host she concentrated on him. Mr. Bingham was an enormous man, at least six foot three, with iron-grey hair and a huge pale moon of a face, in which a pair of lively grey eyes shone—he flourished a tumbler of whisky-and-soda, rather to Julia's surprise.

“Honoured, Miss Probyn. A great pleasure. What will you drink?”

“Oh, I'd like to follow your example,” said Julia, in her slowest tones. “I'll come with you,” she said as he moved off towards the buffet.

“Now that's a sensible girl! Would you ever get it, if you didn't come with me? And aren't you wise to choose whisky. Scotch or J. J., by the way?”

“Oh J.J., please,” said Julia. She had already decided that her host was an Irish Bingham, and probably in a fairly receptive state, early as it was in the evening; it would be a sound move to opt for Irish whisky, which in fact she loathed. While he was fetching her drink she made a second rapid
decision as to her preliminary approach, and when he returned with her glass acted on it at once.

“Mr. Bingham, where is the money here? Who makes it, and from what?”

He stared at her.

“Good God! Whatever makes
you
ask a thing like that?”

“Oh, didn't Paddy tell you I'm a journalist? And where the money is is rather a primary question about a place, don't you think? I shan't quote you, naturally, but that's the first thing I need to know.”

“Of course you're quite right,” Mr. Bingham said; as he spoke he moved through an archway, holding up a looped curtain for Julia to pass, and took up a position by a bookcase in the next room. “Well, phosphates apart—you know Morocco produces twenty per cent of the world's output of phosphates—the big
quick
money is mostly made in this town,” he began.

“From?”

“Real estate: land values in this place keep soaring like in Shanghai in old days, or in some American boom town; and petrol-stations, and the smart shops, and a bit of night-life.”

“Is any made outside Casa?”

“Oh, yes; Agadir is developing very fast too—and the citrous fruit industry is becoming quite a big thing. And besides dried peas, they're starting canned peas too, and tinned fish; the French are very go-ahead about all that, and it gives a lot of employment, and brings money into the country.”

“Anything else?” Julia asked.

“Well, no one really knows yet what's going to happen about the oil industry.”

“Oil! You mean petroleum? Do they get
that
here?”

“Oh, yes—there's that big cracker-plant at Petit-Jean. But I fancy,” Mr. Bingham said, leaning towards Julia confidentially, “that the petrol yield may not come up to expectation. Faults in the limestone bedding, they say—don't really understand
all that myself. But I gather Morocco is never likely to become a second Kuwait.”

“That's all most useful,” said Julia. “I can't thank you enough, Mr. Bingham.”

“Don't you want to write any of it down?” her host asked, looking at Julia with a sort of two-edged interest.

“Oh dear, no. It stays,” said Julia, tapping her big white forehead. Mr. Bingham laughed.

“That's the lot, is it? No small handy side-lines?”

“Well, there is one little side-line—no, two.”

“Oh, what are they? Readers like side-lines,” said Julia professionally.

“Well, it's a funny thing, but there's getting to be quite a trade in Moorish stuff—you know, antiques, leather goods and brass and so on. All that used only to be on sale in Fez or Marrakesh, but quite recently the merchants up there have started sending their sons or nephews down to the coast, to Port Lyautey and Rabat and this place, and even to Mogador and Agadir to open up shops—and you'd be surprised what they're making out of it. A lot of the sons could buy father out now, after only two or three years.”

“Fascinating,” said Julia. “I must look up these sons! And what's the second side-line?”

Mr. Bingham again looked confidential, and leaned further towards Julia along the top of the bookcase.

“Well, they're doing quite a bit—curious thing—in some of these rare metals.”

“What, uranium?”

Mr. Bingham looked slightly embarrassed. “Well, not pitchblende”—he hemmed a little. “Don't get that here, but they find a lot of queer things, some of the ones with numbers and fancy names—elements, don't you call them?”

“Oh, like titanium and molybdenum?”

“What a girl you are! Yes, they do mine molybdenum, and antimony and cobalt as well. Cobalt of course is enormously
valuable; it's worth about a guinea a pound. The French concessionaries are mining that in a biggish way. Wait—I'll bring you the other half.”

In Mr. Bingham's absence Julia
résumé-d
what she had heard and stowed it away neatly in her mind. There wasn't much in phosphates and chick peas, even canned ones, for an article, and Casablanca night life had been done to death, but there could be a story in the curio-sellers' rich sons, and possibly in these metals. A guinea per pound was a nice sort of price to write up. When Mr. Bingham returned with their glasses—“Do go on about the cobalt and molybdenum,” she said.

“Cheers!” said her host, drinking to her. “I like intelligent girls! I hear they're finding newer stuff than cobalt too,” he added.

“Who are? The French?”

“The French have the regular concessions, of course, but—well, don't quote me,” he said again, “but it was the Germans who began on these new things.”

“What, before the War?”

“No, no, just a year or two ago—the East Germans, they say. But other people have started in now as well, on the Q.T., I gather, and without bothering about concessions too much—though everyone connected with it seems to keep their mouths fairly tightly shut.”

“Could I use that at all? I mean, if no one will talk, how do I get a story?” Julia asked.

“Ah, that's up to you,” said her host, rather belatedly looking discreet. “I've said too much already, I daresay. But I've given you the tip—a nod's as good as a wink, as we say in the Twenty-Six Counties! And I should think you could make a mule talk, if you gave your mind to it!”

“Oh, how sweet you are! And you have helped me so much. But I'm sure I ought not to monopolise you any longer,” said Julia—“You've been so liberal. Push me off onto someone else now.”

“Who'd you like to meet? The Prefect and the City Fathers?”

“Well, really, I'd rather talk to your partners. Haven't you any Turks about? I think it's so frightfully odd and amusing, finding the Banque Regié Turque here,” Julia said, with Mr. Panoukian well in mind.

“Oh, there are good reasons for that. But if you insist on Banque Regié Turque bankers—Hey!” Mr. Bingham called, above the roar of voices. “Panoukian! Come over here.”

A short slender man with a greenish white face, dressed in a tightly waisted suit, with a carnation in the buttonhole, and sharply pointed shoes, obeyed his summons.

“Panoukian, let me introduce you to Miss Probyn, a friend of Paddy Lynch's. She's a journalist, and she wants to know about Morocco, but she only wants to learn it from bankers!” said Mr. Bingham expansively—he then moved away.

Julia deployed her rather varied arts on Mr. Panoukian, who was clearly highly intelligent; his queer topaz-coloured eyes looked at her with the expressionless steady glare of one of the great cats, a lion or a panther; but he shot out information and sympathetic wit in faultless English, and on a higher level than Mr. Bingham's. They got on very well—so well that at last Julia decided to plunge. Leaning a little towards him on that same confidential bookcase, she said—